The band travelled through a succession of hostile realities, staying in each only long enough to randomly reset the stars and escape. Finally arriving in a barren but unthreatening world, Stryke calibrated the instrumentalities properly. His plan was to return Pepperdyne and Standeven to Maras-Dantia, then take the band back to Ceragan.
But the stars inexplicably deposited them in a world of islands, on an isle inhabited by dwarfs. The orcs’ seemingly miraculous arrival saved them from massacre by the dwarfs, who took them for gods. Shortly after, the island was raided by human slavers, the Gatherers, who carried off a number of dwarfs, including Spurral. Securing two boats and a crude map, the Wolverines set out to rescue her. The Gateway Corps, who had followed the warband to this world, were on their trail.
Spurral found herself at the mercy of the Gatherers’ ruthless leader, Captain Salloss Vant. She immediately began fermenting mutiny among her fellow captives, one of whom, a lame female called Dweega, was thrown overboard by the slavers. Picked up by the Wolverines, Dweega was able to tell them the Gatherers’ course. But the band had to fend off a seaborne attack by the Gateway Corps before continuing their hunt. And Standeven was growing morbidly obsessed with the warband’s stars.
On board the Gatherers’ ship the dwarfs rebelled, and Spurral faced up to Vant and killed him. Taking control of the vessel, the dwarfs began sailing it back to their home. En route they were attacked by a fearsome creature called the Krake-one of “the Lords of the Deep”-and the ship was sunk.
One of their boats having been damaged by the Corps, the Wolverines landed on a nearby island for repairs. It turned out to be occupied by a group of goblins who held captive a number of kelpies who, despite being sentient, were traded as meat. The orcs made common cause with them and killed the goblins. Learning that the Gatherers sailed a predetermined route, and the kelpies’ island was their next port of call, to gather slaves, the Wolverines took a goblin ship and headed there. They didn’t know that Spurral and a handful of other dwarf captives, having survived the shipwreck, had washed up on the kelpies’ island, and been nurtured by them.
Jup and Spurral were finally reunited. Feeling honour-bound, Stryke agreed to return the liberated dwarfs to their island home. On the way, Coilla and Pepperdyne’s friendship, frowned on by many in the band, escalated and they secretly became lovers.
Shortly after the orcs reached the dwarfs’ island, the Gateway Corps appeared, and Pelli Madayar again demanded Stryke’s instrumentalities. His refusal sparked a battle, with the Wolverines facing the Corps’ sorcery. The band narrowly avoided being overwhelmed when Jennesta arrived with her force, and magical combat broke out between her and the Corps.
At the height of the chaos, Jennesta confronted Stryke. And to his astonishment she was with his mate, Thirzarr, who was in an hypnotic trance, one step from the full zombie state, and under Jennesta’s control. With horror, Stryke realised that Jennesta must have travelled to Ceragan to capture Thirzarr, and could have inflicted untold destruction on his adoptive world.
Jennesta offered Stryke a deaclass="underline" surrender the Wolverines to her, for conversion to undead servitude, and Thirzarr would be freed from her bondage. Refuse and Thirzarr would become a zombie, never to recover. Stryke struggled with the proposition, and turned it down. At which point Jennesta declared that the outcome would depend on one-to-one combat between Stryke and Thirzarr. At Jennesta’s command, Thirzarr launched a murderous attack on Stryke. He desperately fought to suppress the killing instinct that could have had him slaying his mate. Only chance, and the intervention of Coilla and Wheam, prevented it.
Rescued from Jennesta’s malign presence, Stryke yielded to despair. The Wolverines, retreating in disarray, saw no prospect but failure.
FIVE YEARS EARLIER
Events were finally coming to a head in Maras-Dantia.
Jennesta had led an army to the snowbound north, into the shadow of the advancing glacier. Once there, they laid siege to Ilex’s great ice palace.
She didn’t care about the fate of her Manifold Path army. An alliance of humans, orcs and mercenary dwarfs united in common cause against the God-fearing forces of Unity, the Manis were no more than a convenience to her. The only thing that interested Jennesta was inside the palace.
The situation had been compounded by treachery. Mani dragon mistress Glozellan had sided with Jennesta’s enemies and brought her charges into play. A squad of leathery behemoths, saw-like wings beating furiously, spewed gouts of flame over the army. And Jennesta’s father, Serapheim, used his sorcery to paint the grim sky with images that grossly lied, to sway her militia and break its spirit. Though she expected no better from that quarter.
As more snow began to fall, stinging the troops’ flesh and blinding their vision, she grew impatient. Accompanied by her orc commander, General Mersadion, and half a dozen of her ablest Royal Guardsmen, she gained entry to the palace.
Its murky corridors held the stench of age-old corruption, and aberrant, inhuman sounds echoed through the crumbling pile.
Jennesta and her group were not the first to get in. Several advance parties of Manis had entered before them. Their corpses littered the place. Without exception they were terribly mutilated, and in many cases it looked as though they had been partially consumed. Despite his orcish spirit the general’s disquiet was palpable, and the guardsmen, holding aloft oil-fed lanterns, were plainly anxious. Jennesta paid no attention.
They had hardly penetrated the labyrinth of twisting passageways and cavernous chambers when misshapen figures began moving from the shadows.
The Sluagh, a loathsome shape-changing race reckoned by many to be demons, infested the palace. Alien in form and in deed, they were entirely merciless. As they swiftly proved when the two hindmost guards in Jennesta’s party were brought down and torn apart. Ignoring their screams she hurried on, the general and the other troopers, ashen-faced, close behind.
They hadn’t gone far before the creatures struck again. Lurching from the gloom, fibrous hides glistening moistly in the dim light, one of them snared a guardsman with sinewy tentacles. At the ready this time, the soldier’s comrades and the general turned to hack at the Sluagh.
“Leave him!” Jennesta snapped.
Their fear of her outweighed any feelings of solidarity. They abandoned the shrieking trooper. Glancing back, Mersadion caught a glimpse of the man’s fate, and shuddered.
There was a respite as Jennesta strode on, looking for a way to reach the palace’s lower levels. But it was short-lived. Turning into a narrow passage they found a pack of Sluagh ahead. Slavering and giving off a confounding babble, the beasts advanced. With her own safety at stake, Jennesta acted, fashioning a spell with an intricate movement of her hands, though with an air of blase impatience rather than any kind of dread. A searing flash lit the darkness. The Sluagh burst open like ripe melons sliced with an invisible axe, liberating their steaming viscera as they fell.
Jennesta continued walking, lifting the hem of her gown above the mess. The others followed, gingerly stepping over the carcasses, hands pressed to their faces to keep out the stench.
They came to an arched doorway opening on to a flight of steps that went down into pitch blackness. A faint rhythmic throbbing could be heard from below. Jennesta ordered two of the three remaining troopers to stay at the entrance and stand guard. From the expressions the pair wore it was obvious they didn’t know whether to be relieved or alarmed. There was no such ambiguity on the third soldier’s face when she pointed to the stairs and told him to take the lead.